We have just too much space. Consider great cities, think density. Think walking, people and great architecture...public spaces. The constraints those cities were under where slightly different than todays cities - Trade, Health, Politics, Security....it wasn't until transportation and cheep energy did cities inflate to the linear, car dominated scale we find today. Even Chicago in a post fire freak out, create an urban form of safety, well within the density of the human scale. Bring on the car and places like Branson, Missouri (above) have come to be the expected urban form, now found all over the world.
So, with the car as our urban measuring stick, can new great cities evolve? Dubai is a transportation disaster, and newer cities being built have simply removed the car for good. New Urbanist have recycled older urban models while some cities simply take on "Eruo-urban" elements (like round-abouts and landscaped medians) as if it really mattered.
I'm not anti-car. I want to ask this question: how will peak oil impact the American urban fabric? We are already seeing an emergence of smaller cars pushing through in the marketplace. There has also been a spike in the number of riders of public transportation. We are already experiencing lower real estate markets for housing stock in suburbia.
Will our cities see a new formal/design transformation. What role can the car play in remaking our cities? How can re-thinking the automobile assist in creating that transition.
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